John Delcos enters his third season covering the Mets for The Journal News after eight seasons on the Yankees beat. Prior to coming to New York, John covered the Baltimore Orioles, Cleveland Browns and Cleveland Indians.

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JohnM

I wonder how much the credit the organization gives to Warthen for Oliver’s turnaround. If they decide to go with a new manager/ pitching coach for next year how would it effect their pursuit of Perez?

Ollie and Delgados re-emergence has been the difference in this teams fortunes. I give the warthog full credit for Ollie and Pelfry. Delgado? Was it willie? who knows, but he hit another bomb last night and is playing better than he ever has as a met. Ollie is not gonna come cheap, but the mets need him back. 5 years at 15m per should do it.

Let’s see what develops from here…the schedule favors us and Church might return…either way we are finding out about our young people…and F. Martinez is still out there. The big question is the bullpen..and my thinking is that we have options here and at the minor league level..with Stokes being given a strong loon see tonight!

If the Mets allow Pedro, Delgado, Alou and El Duque to walk, that will free up more than $36 million in salary; if they’re unable to retain Perez, the number surpasses $43 million.

As of now, hitters like Teixeira, Dunn and Burrell will likely be on the free-agent market, along with pitchers like Sabathia, Sheets and Rodriguez.

And, of course, the Mets will likely have a glut of 1B/corner OF candidates among Church, Evans, Murphy, Carp, Fernando Martinez and Ike Davis. I wouldn’t be surprised to see one or more packaged somewhere.

I don’t care what people think. Pitching wins championship. When you have a young lefty with electric stuff and who happens to be a big game pitcher, you do whatever it takes to resign him. I’ll go to war with Santana, Maine, Perez and the Big Pelf

You know Im not discounting the effect Warthen has had on Perez but keep in mind the success he had last year under Peterson. I think with him more than anything it is focus, if he can keep his focus he can be as good as anyone on the mound. Now the thing that you have to worry about is once he signs that big contract will he be able to keep that focus. It’s a very real question to ask when you have a guy whos been so up and down and will command a ton a money. I hate to say this but I can see the guys in the bronx throwing a ton of money his way if they miss out on Sabathia…

When Ollie was “coin flip,” I was all for letting him be someone else problem. Now that he has seemed to get things right, I wouldn’t mind seeing him in the rotation next year as long as his contract is reasonable….and with Boras as his agent, that’s probably not going to happen. Wouldn’t go more than 4-5 years….I agree with metsnoob, pitching does win championships and if the Mets could resign Ollie and possibly sign Sabathia, the rotation of Santana, C.C., Oillie, Maine, and Pelfrey is bigtime! With that rotation, you can have fillins at LF & RF, keep Delgado, and send Castillo packing and make Daniel Murphy the 2B. This team would be killer!

If they don’t pick up Ollie, they almost have to get Sheets and call up Niese. This has become a pitching-first team, we can’t afford to lose a 27 year old with Ollie’s ability and big-game poise. We constantly whine about not having clutch hitters or a clutch bullpen. How could we let possibly the most clutch player on our team go. Really, is there another pitcher you’d want going against the Phillies in a big game?

Ollie + Niese will cost significantly less than Pedro + Ollie does this year. Signing CC is not a good idea. He’s a huge fat_ss who will break down like Bartolo Colon.

It seems like we should keep Delgado, possibly at a renegotiated rate. If not, maybe we let Murphy play there and save some $$. F-Mart could be ready to play left by the beginning of next year, especially if Church is doing OK. Perhaps we pick up Delgado’s option and trade him to an AL team for an OF or RP.

If we don’t bring back Delgado, K-Rod is a possibility. He will cost too much, but he’s young and would probably change this team more than any other free agent could. If Wagner gets pissy, we can trade him. If he doesn’t, then having Wagner for the eighth and K-rod for the ninth would be unbelievable. It would feel almost like Rivera-Wetteland did for the Yanks.

I get a kick out the sudden Ollie love affair. Last year at this time nobody wanted Alou back, he gets hot and healthy for one month and everybody demands his return. Good move indeed! This year most couldn’t wait for Ollie to be gone. A good stretch and he has to return. So if he has three bad starts are you all going to want him gone again?

I think you sign him or pick up a stud to replace him. Then you bring up Niese to replace Pedro. Kunz will stay next year so you already have the 8th/8th inning guys in the pen here. You make some decision on everyone else, but keep in mind the pen is mostly a crap shoot.

The org needs to start teaching their starters to go at least 7 and the pen will be fine.

I would rather keep Delgado and keep the young guys pushing the older bench players out.

This would make our team younger, give us a better bench and create competition. Church needs to finish the year healthy and FMart will be up sometime next year.

We will have to give Castillo away. He is getting killed in the minors.